


The Waiting Room

by GentleGiraffe



Category: Twin Peaks
Genre: Black Lodge, Gen, Post Season 2, continuing to season 3
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-17
Updated: 2018-09-17
Packaged: 2019-07-13 09:01:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,002
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16014659
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GentleGiraffe/pseuds/GentleGiraffe
Summary: Cooper's POV of those 25 years stranded in the lodge.





	The Waiting Room

Cooper didn’t know how long he had been gone. He couldn’t remember what it was to feel time. The logical passing of it, the structure it brought—that was all abandoned in the lodge. There was nothing to hold onto. There was nothing at all. 

All he was left with was the dizzying cycle of repeating a path over and over, only to realize he had been in the same chair the whole while. The nonsensicality of watching a person speak and feeling the air thick like honey as the words took days to reach his ears. 

His mind felt too slow to process what was happening. He should be more scared. He should be more worried. He was trapped in this waiting room with no way out. He’d been here for days and he had only been here five minutes, Harry was right outside. 

Years passed and Cooper didn’t notice, though he felt it in his bones that he wasn’t the same man, couldn’t have been the same man that walked through the curtain just last night. 

The jumbled cry of “find Laura” rang through his ears. But Laura was right here with him now. Why was Leland so upset? 

He wasn’t sure if he slept here, but he wasn’t sure why he would even think that. Only a few seconds had passed since he entered. Ten years had gone by and he couldn’t remember blinking. 

He breathed, he walked, he followed, he listened. He knew he was supposed to be learning something. He knew he was here for a reason. A reason that had long since escaped him. 

By the time he organized his thoughts enough to ask a question whoever had been speaking to him was gone. Whatever they had said had already dissipated like smoke. There was no catching up.

He saw himself cackling, howling, energy coursing through his veins. Heard the crackle of electricity and saw blood, blood, whose blood was that. 

He was sitting and waiting and Harry was right outside. 

“Is it future or is it past?” 

Why, it’s now. That’s all it ever is. 

He had been here before and it was all new to him. He sat frozen, it took all his strength to raise an eyebrow. He felt heavy and his thoughts were out of sight, out of reach, not part of him. He was running.

MIKE was sitting in front of him. MIKE was standing across the room. He was alone and MIKE was sitting in front of him. 

He was chasing himself and he was watching the curtain swish open and shut. There was no sound here and it was deafening. There was screaming and it felt far away and garbled. A whisper pierced his ears and he could hear the electricity stinging. 

He had been here twenty years and he had just arrived. He knew nothing of his old life and he hadn’t changed a bit. The floor was viscous and the air was sharp. He was terrified and he couldn’t feel a thing. His mind went blank and thoughts of Laura suffocated him. 

He was falling but he hadn’t moved. He was writhing and sitting completely still. He was filled with a warm sense of calm and icy panic seared his mind. He could see the sky over a highway. All he could see was red. 

He couldn’t remember how to walk. Following MIKE felt so natural. He hadn’t stood up in two days. Harry was right outside. He couldn’t remember who Harry was. Harry was right outside. 

Cooper thought that if he had just a bit more information, he would be frightened. There was a tickle in the back of his mind he couldn’t quite reach. He worked to collect the words said to him. He dropped them all, watching as they shattered against the ground. He was here for a reason and he couldn’t leave yet. 

And then, he was somewhere else. “Nonexistent.” The word bounced in his mind and he couldn’t make sense of it. He felt each letter separately and the syllables were meaningless. 

Stars and darkness. Trapped and free. 

The sea was purple. The sky was vast. Cooper noticed the floor wasn’t black and white anymore, and he had no idea what this observation meant or where it came from. He was drifting. His mind was cotton. He wanted to sleep. His every nerve was on fire. He had to keep going. Harry was right outside. 

There was a woman in this room. A fire, walk with me. He was next to her and he wasn’t. He was across the room and they were so close. Was she speaking? There was noise he couldn’t place. 

Something was drawing him closer. She was falling. There was a woman in this room and he was walking and he was still. Noise. So much noise. There were stars and he was somewhere else. Events happened around him and he wanted to participate.

He was drawn to something. This was the strongest he had felt in, well he didn’t know how long. He had no way of knowing how much time had passed. But he needed to follow the electricity. Finally, he knew something with a sureness he didn’t recognize in himself. It had been so long. It had only been moments and it had been all the time in the world.

His body stretched and stretched. His muscles screamed and every fiber in him vibrated. He felt a pulling and discomfort but he felt as if he was watching it all from outside himself. 

Everything was tight and everything was so loose and he had no control over his body. He had no control over anything. 

There was softness below him and his body was tingling. 

A voice. “Dougie?” 

He couldn’t think. He couldn’t understand what was going on. He knew he needed to keep going and his body wouldn’t move. He was here for a reason and he couldn’t leave yet. Harry was right outside.

**Author's Note:**

> This was so fun to write I might add onto it in the future but for now let me know what you think! (also i hate stylizing MIKE in all caps but that seems to be the trend so here we are)


End file.
